


talk to your friends, talk to my friends, talk to me

by heartsinhay



Series: HSWC 2014: Sequel Time, Sequel Time [1]
Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: F/F, Homestuck Shipping World Cup 2014
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-25
Updated: 2014-05-25
Packaged: 2018-01-26 11:31:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1686788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartsinhay/pseuds/heartsinhay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Porrim wakes up, she discovers that Aranea and Meulin's breakup has plunged her friends into a spiral of drama and bad decisions from which they may never recover. (Spoiler alert: they do.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	talk to your friends, talk to my friends, talk to me

 

When Porrim woke, it was to chaos.

 

The golden tiles of her Prospit bedroom were slick with thrown coffee. One of her beautiful bookshelves had fallen over, trampled novels strewn all across the floor. Her curtains were on fire. And in the middle of it all, having what seemed like a fierce and significant argument, were her friends. Latula, standing slightly apart from the bedlam that Porrim’s bedroom had become, was the first and only one to notice her.

 

“Rad,” she said, walking over to Porrim’s bed and offering an outstretched fist, “You’re awake!” They bumped fists, then high-fived, then wiggled their fingers against each other’s palms, Porrim a little less enthusiastic than Latula, as usual, though the routine of Latula’s elaborate handshake carried her past her disorientation.

 

“Do you know what happened?” she asked, “Why am I here? The last thing I remember was the Scratch, and while it was happening Meenah held something up—“

 

“You’re dead, girl,” Latula replied, simply, “Kind of a bummer, but, hey, that’s death! And now your ghost self is up, just in time to pick a side. Great timing, P-Mary. Up high!”

 

Porrim’s head ached like a sopor-shot hangover, and the loud arguing of her so-called friends didn’t help anything. None of this made sense: dying, ghost selves, Cronus making eyes at Kurloz in the middle of the room…

 

“Why would I need to choose a side?” she asked, giving in to the inevitable. At least it would be Latula and not Aranea (who was currently engaged long and vociferous complaining about… someone’s fashion choices?) doing the exposition.

 

“Serket and the kitty cat are breaking up,” Latula said, and paused, correcting herself, “Have been breaking up. For the last five days. Doesn’t mean you have to choose between two of them, though! Which is good, ‘cause that’d be snooze city. If you’re talking sides, and I am, there’re at least, like, six.”

 

Porrim scanned her bedroom. Aranea, dripping with coffee, and Meulin, an empty troll beforaccino now that she noticed, were the loudest, Meulin’s arms crossed defensively as Aranea gesticulated with her hands, but Cronus was arguing with Kurloz, now, and Rufioh and Damara and Horuss all quarrelling with each other. Mituna had planted himself in the middle of that argument, evidently refusing to move out of anyone’s way, and it looked like Kankri had started roving around the room, swooping down to interrupt disagreements with his usual annoying aplomb.

 

“See, Spidergirl and sweater chick can’t agree on whose fault it was (totally Spider’s, btw) and who had custody of all the consorts, and that made Mr. Mohawk and Chopsticks and Ho-Z start their drama train all over again, and Cronus tried to go after Sweaters while she was all vulnerable, which made Skele-man pissed, which made Cronus try to go after <i>him</i>…”

 

“What’s Kankri doing? Telling everyone how problematic their arguments are?”

 

“You got it, girlfriend.”

 

Porrim sighed. Apparently, that was the signal for the people in her room (why were they even here?) even louder, raising their voices and interrupting each other, the continuous escalation in volume making her throbbing at her temples even worse.

 

“—and the reason your behavior on our last date was so obnoxious can be explained by a variety of factors, “ Aranea said, patiently but with relish, “Including, but obviously not limited to, how you weren’t paying attention to a word I said—“

 

“That is so unfair!” was Meulin’s reply, her hands rapidly signing what appeared to be a representation of a small wriggler kicking a quackbeast, then running swiftly away, “I can’t even. Zero cans. Cantown is empty and everyone’s, like, dead. You’re so unfair! Literally none of us pay attention to you! How do you expect—“ She stopped, running out of patience or maybe air, signing something along the lines of a redblooded psychic grasping at the foundations of a building with phantom arms, then flipping the entire building over.

 

Aranea, in response, only continued with the lecture she had started before, talking over Meulin (no easy task). They had begun to lean dangerously close to each other, Meulin’s vituperatively fluttering hands smacking into Aranea as she signed. This, Porrim decided, was the last straw. Her friends could fight as much as they wanted, but she would not let Meulin and Aranea have hate sex and/or try to kill each other on her floor.

 

Kankri walked over to admonish Meulin for not warning for mentions of death and was summarily ignored. Damara had taken the sticks out of her hair, energy crackling ominously around the ends. Mituna had gotten into a disagreement with Rufioh about not being able to see “around that huge-ass helmet, bro”. Meulin’s hands were curled into fists, now, when they weren’t signing anything, and Aranea’s mouth had twisted into a rarely-seen smirk. She stepped forward, even further into Meulin’s personal space—

 

And they sprang apart, the room going silent as an angry, glowing rainbow drinker split the space between them with a loudly rumbling chainsaw. Porrim’s hair was in tangles, her Prospitian pajamas only an old, threadbare tank top that barely covered the tops of her thighs. With the light from her skin shining against the stark black patterns of her tattoos, though, that only made her look even more intimidating.

 

“You,” she hissed, glowering particularly at Aranea and Meulin, who had, after all, started the whole thing, “Are grown women. If you have any sense of sisterhood—“

 

She paused. That wasn’t going to work, was it?

 

“—of common decency—“she corrected, then stopped again. Fuck. That wasn’t going to work, either. Porrim growled and shook her chainsaw, continuing.

 

“If you have any sense of self-preservation, you’re going to shut up, calm down and go home. All of you. Out.”

 

Meulin glared at Porrim and turned on Aranea in defiance, grabbing Aranea’s chin and performing a maneuver that could only be described as an attempt to bite off the other girl’s lips. They went at it for a hot fifteen seconds, Aranea’s hands pulling at Meulin’s hair, before Meulin let go and stalked off with all the others, snarling a “Call me” as she joined the small crowd filing out of Porrim’s room.

 

Kurloz left. Damara left. Kankri left, still lecturing. Latula shrugged, high-fiving Porrim, and left too, arm slung around Mituna’s waist as he wordlessly uncaptchaloged two game consoles and they began to play. Soon enough, only Aranea and Porrim were stood in her room, the wreckage of burnt curtains and overturned furniture slowly reverting to normalcy. That was a mystery, Porrim thought, as was the reason her door opened up into the ocean, but it was a mystery for another day.

 

“So,” she said, glancing at Aranea.

 

“So?” Aranea replied, coyly. Porrim figured that Aranea was probably reading enough of her mind to know what she was about to ask, but both of them knew how this game was played, though Aranea did like to act like she didn’t.

 

“So, does that mean your red quadrant’s open again?"

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Homestuck Shipping World Cup prompt](http://hs-worldcup.dreamwidth.org/18819.html?thread=3252355#cmt3252355):
> 
> Aranea ♥/♠ Meulin
> 
> Remember when Aranea and Meulin dated but had a huge and awful break up that got everyone dragged in?
> 
> This probably isn't enough Aranea/Meulin, like, proportionally? OTL. But even though I'm not used to writing the dancestors, this was fun! Concrit encouraged.


End file.
